Hi, my name is Don!

February 20, 2007

Housekeeping

The night shift can be pretty boring at times. There have been nights where I’ll get most of my work done within the first hour. And then there are nights where I wouldn’t get anything done at all. If that isn’t bad, now I have to take care of housekeeping. As if I didn’t have enough to do already. I didn’t see this coming at all.

Lately, I’ve been a bit behind on work because a lot of the customers are calling in and telling me about their problems. We have a procedure where they would have to open a trouble ticket first. But some of them already have a trouble ticket opened and they’re looking to get an update on the status of that trouble ticket. When they call, I’m usually in the middle of something so I have to drop that and work on their ticket in order to keep them happy.

Then there are customers who call in as soon as their trouble ticket was opened. They want an update on it right away. Of course, there haven’t been any updates on it because it only opened ten seconds ago. When I tell them that I can’t work on that right now because I’m in the middle of something, they throw hissy fits and get all angry. There’s something called first come first serve but apparently, none of these customers know about that rule. Obviously, they think this rule doesn’t apply to them. While I’m working the shift, it damn well applies to them.

With all this distraction, it’s no wonder nothing gets done. I try to manage my time wisely, but it’s hard when the phone is constantly ringing. I already have a hand full of extra tasks that I have to do so adding more to the list will only slow down production.

On the weekend, my coworker told me that a few people were in the office playing a LAN game. From what my other coworker told me, they’re kind of strict on bandwidth use but I guess a LAN game on the weekend doesn’t raise any flags since no one will be in the office. In attendance was the president, the head engineer and another guy from the other department. I don’t know what game they were play. Didn’t ask, didn’t care.

At the end of the game, the president informed my coworker that the person who’s working the night shift should keep the kitchen sink clean. Why the hell is it my job to clean the kitchen sink? I rarely even use the kitchen let alone the sink. I buy my coffee every night from Tim Horton and I throw away the cup when I’m done. If I bring in food, I have my work plastic fork. I throw that into the garbage when I’m done too.

I don’t see any reason why I should be cleaning up after other people. I didn’t make the mess so there’s no reason for me to be cleaning it up. I don’t mind it if I clean a couple of cups here and there but that sink is usually full of cups. If I continue to clean it, the person who made the mess is just going to continue to make the mess. This person must be lazy and enjoy getting other people to clean up after them.

I don’t know why the president didn’t he just send out a memo asking people to clean their own cups and dishes when they’re done. I think that would have been the more logical thing to do. But no, since Tech Support has already been given bits of another department’s task, let’s keep that trend going and continue to give them more work.

I honestly don’t know what’s going on with this company. Things seem to be heading down hill and I don’t know what’s going to happen soon. There was an annual meeting last week but I didn’t attend. The president sent me an email informing me that I wasn’t there. Like, I didn’t know that. I work the night shift and transportation is an issue. Surely he didn’t expect me to be there just because it’s an annual meeting. I tried to reply back with a reason but his inbox was full. I guess he hasn’t heard of Gmail.

From what my coworker told me, he said that the company’s profit was declining due to expenses. They had to cut back on a few things. That would explain why my previous manager was laid off. And I think last week, another coworker was let go. I don’t know why since we’re already short staffed. All of this is news to me and I hear most of it through the grape vine. I have no idea what goes on during the day. When something changes, I hardly hear about it until I ask. I didn’t even know I was supposed to keep the kitchen clean until my coworker told me. Next thing I’ll know, they’ll have be vacuuming and dusting the office. I just hope that it doesn’t get to the point were they ask me to baby sit for them.